Chapter 12

There was a clamor for a pirate pool before we even left the New Orleans dock. Such was the reputation of the Lovely Louise that not one of our passengers feared pirates, they just wanted a pirate attack so that they would have something novel to bet on. With so much demand for betting pools, Logan showed some creativity and set up two pools, one for the date and time of the next attack and one for where the attack would take place. The prizes were increased to $100 each, and the ticket price was raised to $10. Some people still bought multiple tickets. I was the only one on the boat who was amazed at this.

As a concession to popular demand, the men's gambling room now included two faro tables. We were all glad to see this, since it meant more money for the house. Faro is a faster game, but the odds were well in favor of the house; it was practically a license to print money! Incidentally, we still required chips be used for gambling, and only gold or silver was accepted in payment for chips. Of course, we always payed out metal money when somebody cashed in.

Initially, I had stationed two guards with the cashier, more to protect her from the gamblers than to guard the money. I was joyfully surprised to find that the two guards were totally unnecessary, and one guard was more decoration than necessity. The patrons were unfailingly courteous to the female cashier, and she even received the occasional tip! We seemed to attract a pleasant and civilized clientele, a fact that made my job a lot easier.

Our first pirate encounter happened between New Orleans and Vicksburg. We had stopped for fuel at the usual dock and were busy loading when a group of men waving sabers ran at the crewmen. Since they had waited for us to start loading the wood, rather than attack as soon as we showed up, I suspect that this group was led by someone with military experience.

Anyway, our guards were caught somewhat by surprise, since they were not expecting trouble by this time. A couple of our men were struck down before the guards could get their guns into play, but the quick-loading shotguns proved to be up to the challenge. The attackers were not expecting such rapid reloading of the guns, so they kept charging after the first round of shots were fired. This made them even easier targets, so they never were around for the third load.

All 11 pirates were killed in this raid, so cleanup was easy—they were just stripped of valuables and pushed into the river for the turtles to dine on. As usual, the loot was combined and parceled out equally to everyone in the crew, both guards and workmen. This cut way down on the resentment which might have surfaced, since everybody got something from the adventure, even if it was only the price of one beer. After all, it was the principle of the thing!

The two crewmen who were wounded in the battle were awarded a double share of the loot, so they felt that they were amply rewarded. There was some joking among the men that they were going to make sure to be wounded during the next attack.

The real winners from this attack were the betters who had won the pirate pools. I think that they had more fun flaunting their luck in front of the other pool betters than they ever would have spending their money. Whatever, in all cases, the winners used their prizes to buy more tickets in the next round of the pool!

We stopped in Cairo for fuel and to discharge a few passengers who were planning on making connections for traveling up the Ohio River. We picked up a couple of passengers for St. Louis, but Capt. Johnson made a point of saving space for those who had bought tickets when we were last in St. Louis. He figured on giving them free passage to and from Kansas City to repay them for their patience. When I asked the reason for this generosity, his answer was, "Those passengers will spend more at the gambling tables than we would ever collect in fares. Except that it would be a bad business practice, we could afford to let the people travel for free just to give them an opportunity to wager money in our gambling halls. If we made a practice of giving free passage to people, they would soon start using us for transportation up and down the river without ever visiting our gambling business, and that would ruin us, financially."

This explanation provided a lot of food for thought. I could see the logic in charging passage, but I wondered if we could take advantage of the free transportation prospect if things ever got tough.

I spent more and more time in the pilot house with Capt. Johnson learning about running a riverboat. The job was a lot more complex than I had ever imagined, but it was a job that anyone with reasonable intelligence could master, if only he applied himself. By the time we had left Cairo on our way back to New Orleans, I was the de facto captain of the Lovely Louise. Capt. Johnson simply stood in the background and let me run the boat. He seemed to be delighted with my progress in learning what to do and how to do it. On a couple of occasions, he even allowed me to negotiate for wood when we unexpectedly ran short.

He did point out that there were some differences between being the captain of a boat the size of Lovely Louise and a boat the size of Angel. However, those differences were in the details, rather than in the principle of operating the boat at a profit.

I found out some of these differences when we docked in New Orleans. The last of the rebuilding was complete on Angel, and we needed to take her out for a trial run on the river to be sure that everything was just as it needed to be before we took on our first passengers. The first thing we would need was a larger boat crew, since we had much more in the way of engines and other mechanical devices. So, after spending our first two days in New Orleans settling up after our last run in Lovely Louise, we had to hire the additional crew. The nuts and bolts of this job were handled by the mate and the engineer, but, as a matter of course, Capt. Johnson liked to sit in on the interviews. I joined them, but I sat in the side of the room and did not say anything. I just listened and learned. I think I learned more when they did not hire someone than when they did. I didn't have enough technical knowledge to know what they were talking about much of the time, but I watched the interplay of words, looks, and gestures among the interviewers and the prospects, and I picked up a lot of very useful "human resources" pointers and information. Pretty soon, I could tell who they were going to hire long before the interview was finished.

That evening, I discussed the interviewing process with Trevor, and he said that he was in much the same position. He had to depend on the engineer for the technical details, but he was interested in what kind of man they were hiring, and whether or not he would fit well with the people we already had on board.

In a couple of days, everything was ready, and we prepared to take Angel out for the first time. We did everything at a slow and deliberate pace, since no one was really familiar with the new boat. Angel was the largest boat our pilot had ever handled, so he was being extra careful with his maneuvers. He reported to Capt. Johnson that Angel was remarkably easy to handle and he found her quite comfortable already.

We steamed upriver until we came to a convenient place wide enough to turn around. This was a bit awkward because of the increased length of the boat, but the pilot was pleased with the way the boat responded to his commands. We returned to our dock at New Orleans with nothing but praise for Angel.

One of the features added to Angel that had not been available on Lovely Louise was cannon both fore and aft. The caliber was the same for the two cannon so that they could use the same ammunition. The bow cannon was the same one as we had always had, and the stern cannon was simply a duplicate. Three more ex-Army cannoneers were hired to man this weapon, and additional men were hired to act as "infantry support" with the quick-loading shotguns. We now had 30 "marines" and my family under my command, as chief of security. The mate was delighted to give up his command of the marines, since he had plenty to do with simply running such a large boat.